


mostly void, but partially stars

by thehandsingsweapon



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-19
Updated: 2017-02-19
Packaged: 2018-09-25 11:57:14
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,885
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9819344
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thehandsingsweapon/pseuds/thehandsingsweapon
Summary: Why Keith keeps fighting battles he can't win for a man he was born to lose.Knowledge or death, they say. He wants to laugh in their faces. Have they met Voltron? It’s peace for the whole universe or death.I’ve fought Zarkon, he wants to say, but the Galra of the Blade are a little similar to him: they don’t mince words and they don’t mess around and pretty soon he’s fighting one of them.You are not meant to go through that door, they say, time and time again, and Keith thinks of all the things he probably wasn’t meant to do: get lost in space, pilot the red lion …… fall in love with Takashi Shirogane.It’s a word he hasn’t let himself use because love is something soft like a blanket and what he has feels like a battle axe, and it’s Shiro he sees when he finally ducks into one of the trap doors.Shiro who tells him it’s his past or Voltron and that he needs to choose.Keith/Shiro. Oneshot; interludes between episodes of season 1 & season 2. Mostly compliant.





	

The first time it happens Keith expects it to be the last.

They’ve been training on Arus and they can’t form Voltron and even level-headed Shiro is starting to show dangerous flickers of irritation and temper. Keith recognizes it because he knows rage so well. Fury is an old friend, a welcome guest in all the halls of his being but Shiro holds his anger at arms’ length, hides that part of himself from the rest of the team.

Team: an ironic word, that, at this stage.

They suffer through another day of Coran’s endless list of sadistic training programs; they’re exhausted and demotivated on the bridge and one by one everyone excuses themselves to crawl back to their quarters to sleep. For once he waits. Sometimes fire is the slow burn. He follows Shiro soundlessly to the baths, silent as a shadow, and when they collide there, frustrated and hungry, he promises himself he’ll live with it.

Sex itself is human, and Shiro had been a captive of the Galra for such a long, long time.

Shiro is unyielding and demanding and there’s a moment where he’s pinned Keith’s wrists over his head, lips hot on his throat that Keith thinks could nearly be enough. He resists command, though, and he’s too quick, his hands are too greedy, and after they’ve both come in the showers they rinse off without a word.

He sleeps bonelessly and without dreams after that, and the next day the two of them fly together better, but that doesn’t mean he wants Shiro kissing Pidge.

 

\- - -

 

Shiro doesn’t tell anyone this but Keith knows without asking: he sees the battle against the Robeast on the Balmera as a loss. It’s the planet itself that defeats the monster, not Voltron, and he catches Shiro on the training level for hours, readily analyzing what went wrong, what they could’ve done better. He watches Shiro fight until he’s tired of watching, and tired of waiting, and he helps himself into the training level to offer a more unpredictable opponent.

Shiro stares at him for a long moment, uncertain, _hesitates._ Keith punishes him for it.

Afterwards Shiro gets him out of his clothes and they inspect each other for bruises. There’s no furious kisses, nothing to write off as logical desperation in the vastness of space or in the terror of their mission. Keith does the same; smirks when he gets a wince out of their captain.

In a fight, he gives as good as he gets.

This is no searing kiss, no shower makeout, no fast and furious handjob. Still, Shiro’s gaze is fond and the touch of his fingers is light and this is almost more intimate: to have fought someone without fear, and then to bandage them back up.

 

\- - -

 

He’s fighting a training droid when the ship decides to try to kill them all. Most of the rest of the universe is out to kill them; maybe it was only a matter of time before the Castle joined in.

Allura destroys what’s left of her father to save them all, and Keith’s feelings tie into a complicated knot that he doesn’t feel like dealing with. For however short a time, Allura got to hold onto a ghost. Now she’s really an orphan too, the way he is, except he’s terrible at offering comfort and he doesn’t want to watch Shiro try to do it.

Shiro who ejected Sendak into the unforgiving void of space.

He goes back to his quarters rather than try to face a training droid again and is almost asleep when the knocking comes. _Fuck off, Lance!_

Except it isn’t Lance.

It’s Shiro in the hallway, hesitating again, and Keith never hesitates.

Shiro telling him that he let the team down, that _the voice_ got the better of him. Shiro, who says he was told to _join the Galra,_ that he was _just like them._ Shiro, who thinks he’s just committed a war crime by ejecting a prisoner; Shiro whose fingers are desperate as they clutch Keith’s shirt.

Shiro who was told he was unworthy of being the black paladin and who, here and now, believed every word of it.

“Bullshit,” mutters Keith, his hands on either side of their captain’s face, his kiss the kind of purifying fire that burned away doubt.

Shiro falls asleep with him.

It’s strange but not uncomfortable.

 

\- - -

 

Allura is captured and Shiro shuts him out entirely. Keith watches as he tries to shoulder the collective weight of their responsibility singlehandedly.

As though if Voltron failed to save the universe only Shiro could possibly be to blame.

As though it had ever been a fair expectation to begin with: these five flawed heroes, so young and so vulnerable, tasked with the liberation of all of tangible space.

 

\- - -

 

He fights Zarkon in a battle he knows he can’t win but can help but fight anyway. Zarkon, who has dared to eject _Shiro_ from the black lion, from _Voltron._

Zarkon who is holding the bayard that ought to be his captain’s.

Keith loses himself in the red lion because it’s not worth saving the universe if Shiro’s not going to be in it. He shuts the others out because its Zarkon, not Shiro, who doesn’t deserve that bayard.

He loses and loses again but the red lion is with him, ready to _burn_.

 

_\- - -_

 

The portal goes to shit and yet somehow they still manage to crash together. He’s never been so glad to hear Shiro’s voice, and for the second time in a matter of hours Keith is flinging himself into danger.

The geysers that ripple underneath his touch as he races across the plain of the dead moon are troublesome but ultimately they mean nothing: he’s already proven he’d face worse. _Bring it,_ he thinks to a planet that can’t hear him, _I just fought Zarkon and you’re not on my level._

Keith is good at finding ways to do impossible things. Maybe this is why the red lion comes to him so easily; it, too, always ignores the odds. He doesn’t listen to the voice that says that he’s not the pilot of the Black Lion; he leans into his instincts and hopes the lion senses his loyalty to its master.

_Your real master. The good one. You know he’s your pilot and you know I’m going to save him._

There’s a subtle thrill to sitting in Shiro’s chair, doing all the things Shiro would do, imagining Shiro here, flying and leading so effortlessly.

It’s nothing like getting him back in the nick of time. Keith kisses him so hard their teeth rattle, and Shiro groans, and only then does he remember the magical wound the black paladin’s carrying; only then does he exercise a little more caution.

 

\- - -

 

When they get back into the Castle, Keith moves his stuff into Shiro’s room _._ Shiro comes out of the recovery pod with new memories that he wants to talk about but Keith makes him wait. Everything they’ve done so far has been harried, every kiss an emergency, stolen from the brink of death, and for once he wants to take his time.

They spend hours learning each other’s bodies after that. Later he doesn’t know how glad he’ll be for that one night, for those lengthy kisses and the slow drift of their hands. This is nothing like the showers; Shiro’s inside of him steady and slow until Keith loses his patience the way he always does, and then he’s riding him, getting off on the way Shiro’s expression changes from that constant steadiness to increasingly coming undone.

Shiro, who can be reduced to senseless praise: _too much,_ he’s saying against Keith’s throat; _you’re too much, you know that?_

Keith doesn’t talk so much. He’s a little afraid of the things that he might say. Still, Shiro’s determined and a quick learner and he can’t help the shudders, the groans, the way he can at least make Shiro’s name a prayer, though Keith doesn’t know what for or who to. When he comes it’s a sticky mess on Shiro’s stomach and he’s weightless and boneless in the black paladin’s arms.

Later he studies Shiro’s artificial arm while the black paladin watches him, ambivalent, and Keith kisses its palm. He’s heard the whole story. _It doesn’t matter. It’s part of you now._ Shiro watches him with that look on his face that makes Keith’s chest feel too small, so he gives into his instincts again and kisses him.

The realization that he’s no longer using his room is taken in with about as much fanfare as the discovery about _Pidge;_ Keith practically dares Lance to look at him differently after that, but nothing happens.

If anything this change is like something they all knew to expect.

 

\- - -

 

That’s before Ulnaz. Before the Blade of Mamora. Then, because he needs some privacy to figure this whole thing out, Keith retreats back to an empty bunk, unwraps the dagger he’s had for his whole life.

The mystery of it burns him.

He doesn’t tell Shiro, and Shiro watches him constantly.

The Galra find them again and again and _again_ and Keith is beginning to think it’s all his fault. When the chance to prove himself right comes with Allura, he takes it.

He’s never been so sorry to leave the Red Lion behind, never so disappointed to be wrong, for Shiro’s sake. After the battle he murmurs his apologies into Shiro’s collarbone, but Keith’s never thought that he was particularly great with words.

He tries to let his hands tell the story of all the things he can’t say.

 

\- - -

 

Coran takes them all to a _mall,_ where all he gets is a lousy story about people long-since dead when he asks about his dagger, only marginally better than Pidge and Lance, who’ve brought a video game that can’t possibly work and a _cow._

Shiro orders the castle to the Blade of Marmora and before Keith has a chance to share his own reservations about the knife he’s been carrying this whole time, he’s being pushed breathless back into their room, being told an unbelievable story about a psychic plane and the way the Black Lion rejected Zarkon because Shiro trusted. Because Shiro _asked_.

“Of course it did, you idiot,” Keith murmurs, and decides not to advise against this new plan because Shiro’s terrible at hiding what this proving trial has done for him. Like Sendak’s ghost has been haunting him this whole time, telling him what he isn’t, what he can’t be.

To Keith it is plain as day: Shiro is the rightful Black Paladin, their Champion, their lion-hearted leader.

 

\- - -

 

Lance tries to tell him that he’s going to the Blade of Marmora. _Like hell,_ thinks Keith, who has made sure he’s packed the dagger, who’s determined to get answers. He’s more snappish than he should be, nearly shows his hand. Shiro saves the day with a logical solution: he and Keith are going, because the Red Lion is fireproof.

The trip to the base is fraught enough without Shiro telling Keith that he’s got to pilot the Black Lion someday if anything happens to him. _Nothing is going to happen to you._ They’re Voltron now. They’re going to save the Universe together.

He promises to do better and immediately fucks up with Kolivan in front of him and when he’s offered the Trial or Marmora without knowing what he’s signed up for Keith says yes because he’s never backed down from a fight before and now isn’t the time to start.

Knowledge or death, they say. He wants to laugh in their faces. Have they met Voltron? It’s peace for the whole universe or death.

 _I’ve fought Zarkon,_ he wants to say, but the Galra of the Blade are a little similar to him: they don’t mince words and they don’t mess around and pretty soon he’s fighting one of them.

 _You are not meant to go through that door,_ they say, time and time again, and Keith thinks of all the things he probably wasn’t meant to do: get lost in space, pilot the red lion …

… fall in love with Takashi Shirogane.

It’s a word he hasn’t let himself use because love is something soft like a blanket and what he has feels like a battle axe, and it’s Shiro he sees when he finally ducks into one of the trap doors.

Shiro who tells him it’s his past or Voltron and that he needs to choose.

But he’s standing there holding a Galra blade and it was the Galra who took Shiro’s arm, who tortured him, who made him fight in a gladiator’s arena, and Keith _needs to know._ Suddenly he’s home with his father, who’s promising answers, but home is being blown to shit, home is …

Home is a place where his father’s not alive anymore, and Keith knows he needs to leave. He comes to being helped up by a Shiro who seems to know nothing about the conversation they’ve just had, and decides that it’ll have to be enough; Shiro, Voltron …

He gives up the dagger.

It becomes a sword and Kolivan says the words that he’s suspected for some time now, but it doesn’t matter, they shatter him.

_Galra._

He doesn’t even try to speak to the others when they return; certainly not Allura. He’s almost back to his old room by the time Shiro’s caught up to him. Shiro who catches him by the wrist and drags him down the hall; Shiro who practically throws him into their room.

Shiro who has no reason whatsoever to be kissing him right now. _It wasn’t me. They said I was who you wanted to see and that’s why — but Keith, I’d never make you choose._

Keith doesn’t understand and he says as much, pushes Shiro back, builds up a safe distance. _They tortured you and I’m one of them. How can you stand here and say that?_

Shiro’s utterly unphased. This time Shiro’s the one who’s got his hands on Keith’s face, who’s pulling him close for a kiss. “You’re Keith,” he says, “and that’s good enough for me.”

Keith still doesn’t believe him and so Shiro takes it further; Shiro _shows_ him how he feels, submits, even, tells Keith he _wants_ him, puts his legs around Keith’s waist and takes him in. Keith fucks him for the first time, and Shiro catches his hand, and they both think about the significance of it: the artificial Galra-tech, and Keith’s only part-humanity.

Still, all he wants is to wrap their leader up in this pleasure, and it’s gratifying for Keith when Shiro’s back arches off of the bunk and when he can lean forward and swallow the strangled shout of his own name as it falls off of Shiro’s lips.

 

\- - -

 

Hunk calls him Galra-Keith but doesn’t mean it, and Allura treats him like general shit, and their confrontation with Zarkon looms closer and closer. Keith learns to build a life off of his nights with Shiro, falling asleep in a tangle, listening to the hum of the ship, feeling the rise and fall of his chest.

Eventually the Princess comes around. It’s hard for them both.

They have a last time that Keith doesn’t know will be the last time the night before they strike. Later he will agonize over every second of it, wonder whether or not every kiss poured over his skin was Shiro’s way of saying goodbye, and he’ll criticize himself for his doubts because Shiro can’t be gone forever.

In the moment all he knows is how easy it is to lose himself; how distracting Shiro’s hands are, along with the subtle curve of his smile. They try to clean up in the showers and wind up in the same mess they made the first time, except breathless with laughter, they fall asleep and dream that maybe, just maybe, on the horizon there’s a day where they don’t have to do _this_ anymore.

It’s hard for him to imagine life without Voltron, though. He’s the Red Lion, and Shiro is the Black Lion, and there’s no simple _going back to earth_ for either of them now.

Because tomorrow’s uncertain, because they’re not guaranteed a victory, he waits until Shiro’s asleep before he confesses into Shiro’s throat what he hopes the black paladin already knows:

_I love you. I love you. I love you._

 

\- - -

 

They win and the Black Lion comes back empty.

Keith sits in the empty pilot seat for hours, trying to imagine Shiro in it, summoning up the memory of his voice and his smile and his scent. The others come for him one by one but they’re also wise enough to leave him to his grief, to the special place he reached for which none of the rest of them can share. 

He is left with nothing but his hands.

 

Keith is inconsolable.

_Shiro._

He’s also Galra, and he is the fire and the flame of the Red Lion, and someday soon there is going to be _hell_ to pay.

The black bayard isn’t his. He won’t take it.

 _This is temporary,_ he swears to the Black Lion, which sits pilotless in stony silence. _We are going to find him._

_I am going to get him back._

**Author's Note:**

> Netflix + Holiday Weekend = Mistakes have been made. 
> 
> I had no intentions of writing anything for this show and then The Blade of Marmora happened and now look where we are.


End file.
